Ooph, it’s been about a month now since I went on a social media fast to focus on my thesis. Up to my eyeballs (happily) in sci-fi (have I mentioned what my thesis is yet? Oh let me do that first).
Without getting into too much detail (because these things have a tendency to shift/change/completely mutate), my MA thesis in Native Studies is a creative project, specifically a series of speculative fiction short stories centred on Métis futurisms. I’m not sure if you’ve ever read Ted Chiang’s “Stories of Your Life and Others“? You should. One of the stories was adapted into the film “Arrival”, but don’t judge his writing by the movie. What I really love about that collection is that he imagines things like Christian mythology (heaven, hell, angels) or the story of the Tower of Babel as real, and turns them into the science of the world he creates, making space to explore what that might mean for people in the now. It’s brilliant.
I want to do something similar, but with Métis worldviews. I want to accept that our worldviews are correct; I don’t want to translate them or justify them through a colonial lens, I want to proceed into the near and far future with these perspectives as a foundation, and see where it might take us. It’s going to be pretty exciting stuff (both on paper, and in real life).
Before I shift gears, things are really coming together it seems because On Spec just published my very first piece of fiction! Little nerdy baby me always wanted to be a fiction writer and yet somehow I end up doing mostly non-fiction. That’s fine though, because I can do both (hopefully!). My short story, “Dirty Wings” is available in the latest edition of On Spec (#107 vol 28 no 4). On Spec is an Edmonton based speculative fiction publication that I’ve been subscribing to for quite a few years, and I highly recommend you check it out!
There’s also an interview with yours truly following my story. There are some things I wish they’d checked in with me on that sound weird or aren’t quite accurate (apologies to Grace Dillon whose name is spelled incorrectly as Dylan), but they let me say things like Canada doesn’t necessarily have the right to exist, so it’s okay. I mean, I’m going to be totally frank here; I’m more excited about this piece coming out than I was with my book, because this is the kind of stuff I have dreamed my whole life of writing.
On to why I actually decided to write this blog post. For the past few months I’ve been working on setting up a few endowments for students in the Faculty of Native Studies here at the University of Alberta. It’s taken much longer than I hoped to get going, but a major sticking point has been that there is no agreed-upon definition of “Black” in Alberta. If you’ve been following this saga, then you know I’ve got three endowments I’m trying to get established:
- Solidarity Through Scholarship Award
- The Métis in Space Indigenous Futurities Award
- The âpihtawikosisân Graduate Award
Solidarity Through Scholarship is intended for Black students in Native Studies at the University of Alberta. I want to break through the notion that Native Studies is “just for Indigenous people” (although we have a lot of white students as well). Encouraging Black students to take Native Studies is really important I think to fostering solidarity between Indigenous and Black communities in Canada, and it’s one of those situations where we need to put some money where our mouths are. A donor has pledged to match up to $25,000 in donations to this endowment (so every dollar donated is doubled, hopefully ending with $50,000 minimum in the pot). The terms of reference are still being ironed out to ensure that this award goes to who it’s meant for BUT you can now donate to it directly, easy peasy! Just go to the Faculty of Native Studies’ giving page: https://www.ualberta.ca/native-studies/giving/
Click on the big green “Give to Native Studies” button:
I also want to let you know that the Métis in Space Indigenous Futurities Award is probably going to have to have its name changed to “Indigenous Futurities Award”. I’m not going to pretend to completely understand the hold-up there, but I just want to get this money into the hands of a student ASAP so I’m not going to fight it. This is another situation where we have an amazing donor willing to match donations up to $25,000! So again, if you donate, your money is doubled, hopefully resulting in a $50,000 endowment right away! This award is intended for an Indigenous student in any year of their Native Studies degree, based on financial need.
The âpihtawikosisân Graduate Award does no yet have a donor with $25,000 to establish the endowment, so that one will be a gradual build until the funds are sufficient to set up a perpetual award. This award is intended to help any Graduate students in Native Studies.
As much as I’d like to break my social media fast to do a fundraising blitz, I know myself too well; the moment I “cheat” on this hiatus, the hiatus is effectively over and I really, really, really, really need to get my thesis done. This post will I think be tweeted from my account automatically without me needing to peek in anyway.
So if you could help spread the word, that would be amazing. I am very excited to make a concerted effort to recruit more Black and students of colour into Native Studies. I think this could be a truly transformative change that would benefit BIPOC in ways I can’t even fully anticipate yet. I know some folks are donating monthly straight out of their paycheques here at the University of Alberta; it’s apparently an easy thing to have set up. Others are donating from their PayPal or credit card monthly, all small, manageable amounts that really add up.
Anyway, I’m going to leave it at that and send out a huge thanks to the people who have already done so much to make these awards possible!
Now, back to imagining futures where BIPOC can not only survive, but thrive!
I am in no position to donate right now but will be glad to share. I am totally behind in reading your blog too. There is just so much, of everything! Thanks for the introduction to the spec magazine. I love the genre as a way to playfully expand minds out of boxes.
thank you for sharing! I think it’s awesome you got some publishing under your belt. A part of your ‘human growth experience’ that can be shared with family. Yes, I agree, too many people think anything that says ‘First nations, Indigenous, etc.’ get uncomfortable and move away but it also goes for us FN peoples, we got be comfortable to enter places that seem only open to other minorities and if uncomfortable, BYOF – bring your own friend 🙂
I really enjoyed reading DIRTY WINGS in OnSpec. You managed to covey so much character and images in this concise piece. It’s terrific story.
Ahhhhhhhhh! I’m so excited you’ve read it!
Congratulations on publishing your first short story, “Dirty Wings”. And thank you for the info about the genesis of “Arrival” – as far I’m concerned it is the best science fiction Movie of recent times. I look forward to sampling Ted Chiang!
I am a huge fan of sci-fi and the universe of alternate worldviews that sci-fi explores – so I love the notion of what you want to do:
“I want to accept that our worldviews are correct; I don’t want to translate them or justify them through a colonial lens, I want to proceed into the near and far future with these perspectives as a foundation, and see where it might take us..”. Yes!
Cheers
Klaus
Where did the money go that was supposed to be for black students? No more info yet you collected on behalf of black bodies?
Hey, thanks for asking! I’ve given quite a few updates over on Twitter where I tend to be more active. The endowment was fully funded in 2018 and has been disbursed each year since 2019 to a Black student at the Faculty of Native Studies. You can find the endowment listed at the bottom of this page on the Faculty website: https://www.ualberta.ca/native-studies/students/student-awards.html
In addition, folks can continue to donate to the endowment fund to help it grow, so that disbursements are larger each year. That can be done through this part of the Faculty of Native Studies page: https://ualberta.alumniq.com/giving/to/nativestudies Because the endowment has been funded enough to exist in perpetuity, it doesn’t show up as one of the listed options (those endowments are still in need of funding to begin). If you type “solidarity” into the search bar though, the endowment will show up.
Also, this wasn’t part of your question, but I’d like to follow up on the other two endowments as well! The âpihtawikosisân graduate bursary has not been fully funded, but it is being disbursed yearly – it’s just a smaller amount. We also successfully funded the Indigenous Futurities bursary (both were set up in 2018 and began disbursing in 2019). You can see these bursaries here: https://www.ualberta.ca/registrar/scholarships-awards-financial-support/bursaries-emergency-funding/bursaries-by-faculty/bursaries-ns.html